Undoubtedly; that was one of the most popular attractions. It was interactive: people could get behind a desk and conduct make-believe interviews. Future politicians were being groomed in that studio in Bradford. Now it is gone and no fight was put up for it.

To skip ahead in what I was going to say, I belong to the Deng Xiaoping school of socialists: I do not care whether the cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice. The state must of course be a major stakeholder in museums, and free admission must be defended at all costs. The National Media museum has half a million visitors. That is down from 1 million, but it is not nothing. The overwhelming Majority of those half a million visitors are from Yorkshire and Humberside. Most of them, very unusually for a museum, are from lower socio-economic groups. Charging would be a death knell for us and the state must be there to guarantee that that does not happen.

However, the BBC is a national institution that is deeply in need of a new lick of paint to renovate its tattered public reputation. Why does the BBC not help to pay for the National Media museum? Why can the BBC logo that used to be at White City not be up on that building? Its archive is there. The public pay for the BBC. Heaven knows, any money that it spends on the National Media museum might save us from hours of tripe that, I am sorry to say, would otherwise be included in its output.

Perhaps other media outlets could be involved. I am not arguing for the rehabilitation of Mr Rupert Murdoch, but I have written to His Highness Prince al-Waleed bin Talal, with his great media interests, and asked him to sponsor the museum. That is how desperate I was. Perhaps, I am glad to say, he did not reply.